TSX VENTURE SYMBOL: FUU
Surveys expand Isle Brochet boulder fields,
confirm likely source direction and provide prospective areas to
target drilling
KELOWNA, BC, Dec. 19, 2019 /CNW/ - FISSION 3.0
CORP. ("Fission 3" or "the Company") is
pleased to announce the results of recent exploration activity at
its Hearty Bay project in Canada's
northwest Athabasca Basin region.
Prospecting work on the historic Wolfe and Jackfish boulder fields
at Isle Brochet has identified 45 new occurrences of radioactive
boulders with assay values up to 8.23% U3O8,
eclipsing historic peaks of 3.54% U3O8.
Multiple complimentary surveys, including glacial directional
flow determination, marine acoustic seismic, and lake bottom
spectrometer, have pointed to a likely transport direction for the
boulder field and identified markers for the potential source. The
location of these markers represents a clear area of interest for
drill testing.
News Highlights
- Strong Mineralization with important geological
characteristics: Boulder field sampling returned assays from
sandstone and basal conglomerates up to 8.23%
U3O8 and likely represent rocks at or near
the sandstone / basement unconformity. They are interpreted to be
sourced near the Basin margin.
- Potential Source Location Identified: Marine acoustic
seismic survey has identified potential source location to the NE
of the boulder fields.
- Priority Drill Target Area: Marine acoustic survey
completed up-ice direction from the boulder fields has identified
bedrock geological structural features, which may play a role in
controlling the occurrence of uranium mineralization. This is a now
a priority area for drill testing.
Key Technical Details
High-Grade Boulder Field: Prospecting work on
the historic Wolfe and Jackfish boulder fields at Isle Brochet has
identified and sampled 45 new occurrences of mineralized sandstone
and basal conglomerate boulders, returning radioactivity readings
between 190 to >10,000 cps and assay values ranging from 0.07%
to 8.23% U3O8. Over 24% of the boulders
returned assay values of >1% U3O8 with an
average of 3.06% U3O8. The sandstone
and conglomerate lithologies suggests the source originates at or
near the Athabasca Sandstone – Basement unconformity, and likely
nearby. Additionally, historic records report the occurrence
of mineralized basement and sandstone lithologies in the boulder
fields. This strongly suggests that the Athabasca Basin margin represents a
high-priority focus for exploration for source.
Glacial Transport Direction of Boulder Field: Mr.
Paul Ramaekers, P. Geol and Mr.
Roger D. Thomas, M Sc., P. Eng., P.
Geol., have acted as consultants to the project. Their primary task
has been to provide guidance in retracing the ice direction to
locate the source of the boulders. Their work was to study
and interpret the nature and directional features of the boulder
trains, including striation measurements, and has identified that
the likely glacial transport direction was from the northeast. Mr.
Ramaekers and Mr. Thomas' prior work at Fission Uranium's PLS
project was instrumental in determining the transport direction of
the PLS uranium boulder field, which predated the discovery of the
Triple R deposit.
Potential Drill Targets Identified: A Marine
Acoustic Survey completed within Lake Athabasca, to the NE of the
Isle Brochet boulder fields has identified and interpreted multiple
basement hosted structural and lithological features to the NE of
the radioactive boulder trains. These features occur outside
of the currently modeled Athabasca
Basin margin and include signatures interpreted to be Athabasca sandstone overlying basement rocks
and bounded by faults. This interpretation not only pushes
the boundary of the Athabasca
Basin margin in the Isle Brochet area further to the northeast than
currently modeled, but also adds an important structural setting to
this area, which is generally seen as important to controlling the
formation of Athabasca style
high-grade uranium mineralization. Taken together with the
down-ice occurrence of the mineralized boulders, whose lithologies
indicate a near basin margin source, this area is now considered a
high priority focus for drilling.
Confirmation and Expansion of Lake Bottom "Hot" Radioactive
Boulders. A lake bottom spectrometer survey re-established
the historic area of "hot" radioactive boulders discovered by
Eldorado Nuclear. Fission 3's survey has extended the known area of
radioactive anomalies by an additional 40m to the northeast, providing further support
of the most likely direction to the source of the radioactive
boulders.
Ross McElroy, COO, and Chief
Geologist for Fission, commented,
"As these results clearly show,
Hearty Bay hosts two parallel and impressive high-grade uranium
boulder fields. Our geomorphological, geochemical and geophysics
surveys, have resulted in a good understanding of boulder transport
direction, and the potential for source location of the
mineralization. Similar studies proved very effective at
Fission Uranium's PLS project, and were instrumental to the
discovery of the Triple R deposit. Furthermore, sub-surface imaging
from the marine acoustic survey has identified important markers
indicating a potential source of the mineralized boulders. This has
provided high-priority drill targets and we look forward to the
next stage of exploration."
Project Overviews and Further Program Details
The 100% owned Hearty Bay property comprises 3 mineral claims
with an area of 6,881 ha. The property is located on the
north edge of the Athabasca Basin,
20km west of the Fond-du-Lac
uranium deposit and 60km east of the Beaver Lodge uranium
district. The Property surrounds the historic Isle Brochet
radioactive sandstone boulder trains, which are 1 km long dispersal
trains trending along the main ice direction and containing
reported historic values up to 3.54% uranium. Historic
prospecting and mapping resulted in the discovery of additional
radioactive boulders of sandstone and basement origin, ~600m to the
northeast. Historic drilling proximal to these boulders did not
intersect any significant radioactivity, and thus the source
remains undetermined. Current work suggests that this historic
drilling did not target far enough to the north-east.
Strong airborne EM conductors within the property were
identified by historic surveys up-ice of the radioactive boulder
trains. In the late 1960's and 1970's extensive boulder prospecting
during uranium exploration programs identified numerous radioactive
boulder trains in the Athabasca
Basin, some of which led to the discovery of significant uranium
deposits (i.e. Key Lake, Midwest)." The discovery by Fission
Uranium Corp. of the Triple R deposit in 2012 was also made as a
result of the definition, from a high resolution airborne
radiometric survey, of a radioactive boulder train SW of Patterson
Lake.
The following work was completed at Hearty Bay from July to
September of 2019:
- Till fabric analysis and boulder prospecting
- Lake bottom spectrometer survey
- Marine acoustic survey
- Till sampling
- Radon sampling
Till Fabric and Boulder Prospecting
Glacial terrain geomorphological experts Paul Ramaekers, P. Geol. and Roger D. Thomas, M Sc., P. Eng., P. Geol., were
engaged to study the historic boulder train(s) with the aim to
determine the glacial transport direction in the search to discover
the source of the mineralized boulders. Their work at Patterson
Lake was instrumental in determining the transport direction of the
high-grade uranium boulders at Fission Uranium's PLS project, which
preceded the discovery of the Triple R deposit. Till fabric data
collection and boulder prospecting was conducted during the month
of July. Till fabric data was collected from 11 historic trenches
located within the boulder trains on Isle Brochet.
The current work suggests that the Wolfe and Jackfish boulder
trains are separate, discrete and not part of a single fan.
Striation measurements, indicating glacial movement direction, from
14 locations on Isle Brochet provided 50 to 62 degree orientations.
Mr. Thomas interprets that the till fabric data, striation
measurements on bedrock, orientation of the boulder trains on Isle
Brochet and other dispersal trains in the region, particularly the
dispersal train emanating from the Fond
du Lac deposit, all indicate that the strongest ice flow was
from 64 degrees, similar to the interpreted main ice flow direction
measured at Isle Brochet. He concluded that given historical work
in the 70's to find the source of the boulder trains following this
direction of ice flow discovered more radioactive boulders on the
lake floor then it should be considered as the most probable
direction to follow in order to find the source of the boulders. It
is suspected that although the historic drilling explored the most
likely orientation of boulder transport, the drilling was not
conducted far enough in the up-ice direction.
A total of 45 sandstone boulders, ranging from pebble to boulder
size, which gave readings between 210 to >10,000 cps were found
in the boulder field originally discovered by Eldorado. 45
radioactive boulders, consisting of sandstone (38), siltstone (6)
and conglomerate (1) boulders, returned readings between 190 to
>10,000 cps and assay values ranging from 0.07% to 8.23%.
An overall average of boulders was 0.99%
U3O8. >24% of the boulders assayed
>1% U3O8 and averaged 3.06%
U3O8.
Lake Bottom Spectrometer Survey
Special Projects Inc. conducted a lake bottom spectrometer
survey comprising of 1,320 points from September 7 to September 29. In addition to
re-establishing the area of historic "hot" radioactive boulders on
the lake bottom, discovered by Eldorado Nuclear in the 1970's, the
survey extended the boulder train by an additional 40m to the northeast, along the interpreted main
ice direction. This provides further support that this
northeast trend is the most probable direction to follow to
discover the source of the radioactive boulders. The survey also
identified new moderately radioactive boulders, the significance of
which are currently being evaluated.
Marine Acoustic Survey
Special Projects Inc. conducted a 255km marine acoustic survey
NE of Isle Brochet from late July to mid-August.
Interpretations suggest the presence of basement structural
features and possible Athabasca
sandstone outliers, up ice from the currently defined edge of the
Athabasca Basin where Eldorado's historic drilling was focused. One
of these possible sandstone outliers is adjacent to an interpreted
NE-trending structure and is 500m up
ice from the main area of historic Eldorado drilling. Uranium mineralization in
the Athabasca Basin is known to
occur along reactivated basement structures. The reported presence
of both radioactive basement and sandstone within the boulder
trains suggest that the source of the radioactive boulders
straddles the edge of the sandstone basin margin and at the top of
the basement. These features therefore represent potential drill
targets.
Till Sampling
A trial till sampling program was conducted from September 19 to September 30. The till
sample survey was aimed at identifying the radioactive boulder
trains geochemically, using the geometries and extents of the
historic Wolfe and Jackfish boulder trains as controls. On Isle
Brochet, a total of 259 till samples were collected along 6 main
sample lines perpendicular to the boulder trains; uranium
concentrations ranged from 1.5 ppm U to 72 ppm U (ICP, total
digestion); statistically values over 4.5 ppm can be considered
anomalous. In addition, a total of 15 samples were collected
on the mainland, SE of Isle Brochet for background
geochemistry.
The trial survey work was conducted to see if till sampling
could be employed during future programs under the lake to track
the boulder trains to their source. Overall, there was no
correlation seen between location of anomalous till samples and
that of the radioactive boulders. Thus the results suggest that it
will likely not be of assistance in this particular
situation.
Radon Survey
RadonEx completed a radon survey over the area delineated for
till sampling, with the objective to add additional support of the
results of the till survey. RadonEx used radon flux monitors
and completed a total of 148 sample stations during the week-long
survey, completed on September 27,
2019.
While the general trend of the boulder trains was discernable,
the results were generally inconclusive. This may be due to
the gaps in the data because of the presence of wetland areas as
well as areas which lacked overburden. This resulted in almost half
of the original planned survey points being unmeasurable.
Natural gamma radiation that is reported in this news release
was measured in counts per second (cps) using a hand-held GR-110
scintillometer which is capable of discriminating readings up to
9,999 cps.
Samples collected for analysis are sent to SRC Geoanalytical
Laboratories (an SCC ISO/IEC 17025: 2005 Accredited Facility) in
Saskatoon, SK for analysis using
the ICP1 uranium multi-element exploration package plus boron.
Samples returning uranium concentrations >500 parts per million
(ppm) from the ICP1 package were also analysed using the U3O8 assay
(reported in wt %) package. Till samples were analysed using the
ICPMS1 exploration package plus boron. Four 25 kilogram till bulk
samples were also submitted to the SRC laboratory for Heavy Mineral
Separation (HMS) and Quantitative Evaluation of Materials by
Scanning Electron Microscopy (QEMSCAN).
The technical information in this news release has been prepared
in accordance with the Canadian regulatory requirements set out in
National Instrument 43-101 and reviewed on behalf of the company by
Ross McElroy, P.Geol. Chief
Geologist and COO for Fission 3.0 Corp., a qualified person.
About Fission 3.0 Corp.
Fission 3.0 Corp. is a Canadian based resource company
specializing in the strategic acquisition, exploration and
development of uranium properties and is headquartered in
Kelowna, British Columbia. Common
Shares are listed on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol
"FUU."
ON BEHALF OF THE
BOARD
"Ross
McElroy"
Ross McElroy,
COO
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SOURCE Fission 3.0 Corp.